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| photo property of Jim Ward |
Selection & Culling
Written by Tacey Perkins and Robert Blosl
Welcome to Part 1 of this wonderful course, today we will cover
Selection and Culling. The reason I chose these topics to start on is to get
everyone on the same page for next month’s Breeding class. I am so thrilled to
offer this information to you. I wanted to be able to offer you some invaluable
information that you could use year after year to improve your Java
Flock. So I contacted one of the best! A man who has been known in
the chicken breeding industry for his RIR Bantams. He is also into other
heritage breeds like, White Plymouth Rocks in large fowl & bantams and
Barred Plymouth Rock large fowl. It is Mr. Robert Blosl! I for one was excited
to ask these questions and get the answers, because Mr. Robert Blosl is a pleasure
to talk to and a wealth of information. So please enjoy Part 1 explaining
Selection and Culling. We will cover from chick stage to adult stage. Also, if
you have any questions please feel free to contact me. I would be happy
to help you with anything I can. And for a special treat, Robert
has said he will help evaluate your birds, helping with the selection process.
All you need to provide are some nice, clear pictures of your birds. He will do
the rest. And if you would like to ask a specific question, just send it to me
and we will get it answered for next month’s class. Thank you everyone for
coming to class, lets begin!
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| photo property of Jim Ward |
How
many chicks would you suggest them getting in order to grow up a
breeding
trio or two.
Bob-
If you got two dozen eggs you should get a trio or maybe two pair that would be
great breeders for the following year. You want to make sure the birds you breed
from are above average in quality. It is foolish to breed from a marginal
female just to have numbers. I like trio mating so if I had two
very
good females I would try to get between 25 to 35 chicks from this
mating.
Also
would you suggest getting chicks from 2 different sources so you are
not
breeding brother to sister?
Bob-If
I knew the breeder who I am getting a start from, and he has a good gene pool
of above average birds, I would like to stay with this breeder. One reason is you
could work hard to improve what you have from him and then possibly get a good
male or female from him or her a few years down the road for fresh blood. When
you cross strains you are asking for a big mixture of genes and it will take
anywhere from three to five years to level off all the non-expectable genes
from the cross. If the birds that you are getting are
below
average in appearance and possibly inbred, some say yes, you could cross a strain
from someone in California with somebody from say New Jersey. A better idea is
to find a person who lives maybe a thousand miles apart from each other, but
both are from the same master breeders strain.
Yellow
house farm from BYC wrote and asked...
What
do you think is the minimum stock required to begin this plan? If one’s plan is
to maintain 4 pens, how does one build up to four pens if one doesn’t begin
with four separate breeding groups?
Bob-I
have a breeding pen of a white rock pullet, which is the best type female I
have seen in years. I have her and her mother in a breeding pen. That’s two
females. I have her mated to a young cockerel and then when it warms up I am
putting in the cockerals father a cock bird and he has type that won’t quit. So
I plan to hatch about 25 to 30 chicks from this pair. I have two
other
females that are ok but nothing like these two queens. I will then put together
a family of two from this matting. I will only have two trios per year and
breed them and raise about 50 chicks cull very hard and only keep the females
and males that have the type that I am looking for. My goal is to get more
pullets like the little girl I hatched and raised this year. I hope in two to
three years all my females will have the low top line and lift like she has.
Culling-
Once you have chicks, when do you cull for that first year? Do
you
have a culling schedule, like at 1month, 3 month, etc? And what exactly are you looking for at
these specific culls?
Bob-First
month you cull for weaklings and chicks with physical defects then in the
second month you look for chicks that are slow to mature or feather, they again
may have defects in their feet like crooked toes, too many points on their combs-
more than seven, and if they just do not look like they are keeping up with the
other more vigorous chicks. At three months they have their legs dead center,
they have extreme vigor they are feathering at a fast rate, color is not a
issue until these birds get up to five to seven months of age. By the time they
are five to seven months of age you should be able to see who are the better
birds to keep and many times the ones that jump out
in
the front are the best chicks of the year that you hatch. So once you have
culled down to the last several choices. Pick the ones that BEST represent the
SOP AND THE BREED.
Raising-
How do you usually raise up your stock? Do you put them
all
in a single pen or do you separate pullets and cockerels? Do you have
any
tips of the trade on raising large heritage fowl?
Bob-The
first two to three weeks I have them in good size brooder boxes watching for
the fast feathering tail feathers coming out of the chicks tail and
their
wing development in the first ten days to two weeks. If you see
something
that does not please you, you can put a magic marker mark on their head to I.
D. them and when they are about three to four weeks old they are ready to go
into a brooder pen where you may have twenty chicks in say a 8x8 foot pen for
lots of room to grow in. As soon as the chicks start to show
the
combs on the cockerels, you separate the little males from the females so
the
males will not bully the young females. I give them a good 20% game bird developer
feed, fresh water which I use dripping water from a faucet during the hot
months so the chicks have fresh cool water daily, if I have a safe environment
I love to let the chicks roam on free range where they can get fresh grass and
bugs with their normal chick starter during their growth
months.
Incubating
and hatching-
I
know you will touch on this in next month’s Breeding Javas 101 section article
, but
just wanted to know if there was anything else you want people to know about Incubation
and Hatching?
Bob-
When it comes to incubation, the egg has to be super clean and
free
from stains of manure and moisture and from getting wet. Having nest boxes that
are above the ground with straw or saw dust or pine straw so when you collect
the egg it looks like it came from the grocery store. They will
hatch
so much better and the chicks will be healthier. Also, do not keep eggs
more
than five to seven days. You may want to put your eggs in the incubator on
Sunday so they will hatch on Sunday when you are home and can care for the
chicks. Make sure the chicks stay in the Hatcher for 24 to 30 hours as there is
no rush to get them out. They
can live on their own yokes for 36 hours and its best not to give these chicks
anything to eat until the yokes are absorbed into their systems. As this can
cause digestive disorders and pasty butts in days to come. These chicks
normally do not mature to be your best chicks and it’s your fault for forcing
them to eat too soon after hatching.
Homework-
Yes,
there is homework, but this is nothing like you remembered. It is chicken
homework! Ok so I need to prepare you for next month. Robert is going to cover
Breeding pens and how to set them up, how to use them, etc. So GOOGLE what
breeding pens look like. You will have 1 month to make them and prepare your
stock for the breeding portion of this class, the real meat and potatoes. So
here is your homework.
~Robert
is going to refer to the Standard of Perfection in next month’s class. It would
be good to look it up ahead of time and familiarize yourself with your breed.
If you have a Java, we have the SOP right on our website. You can read it there
and make a copy for yourself. Be sure to get the picture too!
~Also,
it would be good to start figuring out what your breeding pens will consist of.
3-4 smaller pens, and depending on how many hens you have, will depend on how
big the pens will have to be. If you have 1-2 hens per pen, it will not need to
be large to accommodate 2 hens, a nest box and a rooster. Remember they only
have to be in these for as long as you are
collecting
eggs to hatch. After that they can go back into the large community coop. So
google/surf the Internet for pictures on breeding pens. And if you already have
some I would love to post some pictures of your breeding pens. So send them in
for all of us to see. Thank you all again for coming to class, we will see you
next month for PART 2- Breeding Pens
& Breeding Method. We will see you in the poultry press again next
month. And a big thanks to our Professor Robert Blosl!
~
Tacey Perkins V.P. Java Breeders of America, You can submit pictures for
evaluation or questions for next months breeding class to...tntperk@hotmail.com
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